An X-ray technician or other attending medical personnel may need to be positioned near a patient during an X-ray examination in order to conduct certain ancillary procedures or to hold the patient's limb or a small child or infant in position during the examination. Accordingly, the technician can be exposed to excess radiation, particularly over the course of time and multiple procedures. Aside from the potentially adverse impact of overexposure to radiation on the health of the technician, government regulations limit worker exposure to radiation. Thus, unnecessary exposure to radiation can result in premature removal of experienced staff from X-ray examination rooms where they are most needed.
Conventional rollaway radiation screens positioned between medical personnel and an examination table not only block medical personnel from reaching the patient but may prevent staff from seeing the patient unless the staff steps around the screen to adjust the patient or to conduct a procedure. This defeats the purpose of the conventional screen during an X-ray examination.
Moreover, equipment clutter in an examination room can become problematic, especially during emergency procedures. Equipment that gets in the way of staff during emergency situations is often pushed out of the way, even equipment intended for staff safety. Also, due to its continual repositioning, the necessary equipment is rarely in proper position when needed, so it often goes unused.
What is needed in the medical field is a system that reduces or eliminates staff exposure to radiation during X-ray examinations without impairing the ability of medical personnel to physically reach the patient to obtain the necessary medical images during an X-ray. The desired system also should be economical to manufacture, and it should be simple, effective, and reliable to use and reuse.